Ride-hailing company Uber is here to stay – at least if Torontonians have anything to say about it.
Uber is increasingly becoming the preferred transportation option for Toronto residents according to a new poll by Forum Research. This could have also been confirmed by saying ‘taxi’ to anyone within city limits and gauging their reaction.
The results showed that 28 per cent say they have used the popular ride-hailing app, which is up from 22 per cent in July and 18 per cent in April.
It also revealed that the majority of users said they were very happy with the service they received from Uber, with 93 per cent saying they were extremely satisfied. Conversely, 52 per cent of those surveyed said they were satisfied with their taxi experience.
“The users… are really, really happy with Uber,” said Lorne Bozinoff, Forum’s president to the Toronto Star.
“That’s what’s driving this whole usage. If people were as happy using taxis, I don’t know if we’d be seeing this kind of penetration in terms of usage.”
There is still tension in the city between Uber drivers and cab drivers as City Hall deals with how to properly regulate Uber.
Thirty-four per cent of people surveyed said they would prefer it if the city loosened taxi regulations to allow cab drivers to compete with Uber, while thirty per cent said Uber should have the same regulations as Toronto taxis.
While the results show that Torontonians are happy with the overall service of Uber, the Toronto Taxi Alliance doesn’t believe that this survey accurately tells the whole story.
Rita Smith, a representative of the Toronto Taxi Alliance, told the Star that the poll didn’t survey every demographic, excluding senior citizens and people with disabilities, for whom using Uber may not be an option.
“We have disability advocate groups that are terrified that Uber will shut down the taxi system,” Smith said. She also added that taxis are the only accessible transportation option for people with disabilities.
“If you’re 28 years old and you have a credit card and a cellphone… that’s great, but there’s a huge chunk of the market can never use Uber,” she said.
Until changes are made, however, Uber is here to stay and ridership will continue to grow as the company expands its range of services, including UberEATS, which connects users to more than 100 different restaurants, and UberHop, its new car-pooling option.
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